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APPLETON -- A 42-year-old man is claiming he was sexually abused by a female kitchen supervisor while he was an inmate at Prairie Correctional Facility in Appleton.

The inmate filed a civil lawsuit Dec. 17 in U.S. District Court in Minnesota seeking damages from the former supervisor, Dorienne Dolores Homan, of Odessa,

Homan's former employer, Compass Group USA, Inc. and Corrections Corporation of America, which owns the Appleton prison. The lawsuit alleges Homan's former employer and the prison are liable for actions that led to Homan's conviction for criminal sexual conduct against the inmate.

Homan, 36, entered an Alford plea to a felony charge of fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct by a correctional employee on June 22, 2009.

An Alford plea in where a defendant does not admit to a crime but enough evidence exists to convict.

Homan has registered as a criminal sex offender as a result of the plea. Her employment was terminated Dec. 19, 2006, a day after the inmate met with a prison psychologist and reported he had been sexually assaulted on Dec. 12, 2006.

The inmate was assigned to work in the kitchen. According to the lawsuit, he had rebuffed a sexual advance by Homan, who then threatened him by saying she could tell a guard he had sexually touched her.

The inmate told investigators that Homan coerced him into engaging in rough sexual intercourse in a storage room. The prison has video evidence of the two being alone in a storage room for five minutes. DNA evidence gathered from the inmate's underwater has material matching the DNA profile of Homan, according to the lawsuit.

Homan told the Star Tribune of Minneapolis that she maintains her innocence and entered the Alford plea rather than risk a lengthy prison sentence if convicted on her original charges of third- and fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct by a correction's officer.

The inmate is being represented by Attorneys Lori Peterson and J. Ashwin Madia, both of Minneapolis.

Minneapolis attorney Lori Peterson, who with J. Ashwin Madia represents the inmate, told the West Central Tribune that she plans to introduce as evidence Homan's criminal conviction as well as proof of her misconduct with another inmate. Homan was written up for misconduct while employed as a kitchen supervisor.

Peterson said her client was diagnosed with severe mental depression and has experienced serious harm. He was kept in segregation after reporting the matter until he was transferred to Lino Lakes Correctional Facility on Jan. 25, 2007. He was transferred from there to Faribault Correctional Facility on Feb. 20, 2009, after he made repeated reports of retaliation by staff and inmates, the lawsuit states.